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SpaceX’s successful launch opens weekend doubleheader

SpaceX’s successful launch opens weekend doubleheader

The year does not exceed half and Space Exploration Technologies Corp. Elon Musk is about to launch more missions than completed in 2016.

SpaceX has successfully launched a Falcon 9 rocket for the eighth time this year Friday, corresponding to the total theft for the entire last year.

Its next launch is planned only two days later, with the fast pace putting the company on track to reach 20 to 24 the total allocations that aim for the year.

The accelerated pace of SpaceX’s launches illustrates how it recovered after its rocket and satellite with a client exploded at a later launch of Florida in September.

The company was grounded for four months during an investigation of the incident before returning to flight in January.

By accumulating the most successful launches, the closely held company positioned itself as a driving force in the new space race.

“SpaceX comes back frantic,” said Luigi Peluso, aerospace analyst AlixPartners. “You see a public announcement that they are completely back from the accident in September 2016.”

And Elon has proven that the concept of rocket reuse is doable. ”

Next release
The rocket that killed Friday centered BulgariaSat-1, a communications satellite of geostationary orbit.

It was launched from historic block 39A at the NASA Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where Neil Armstrong left before landing on the Moon in 1969.

The launch used a Falcon 9 “proven flight” rocket, which means it has been moved to space previously and was returned and refurbished.

The general manager of SpaceX, Musk, defended the re – once ridiculed as a crazy idea – to cut launch costs and win a growing list of customers, including the US Army. Friday marked the second time that a stolen preamplifier is used.

“You start to feel fairly normal reuse rockets, well, that’s for cars and planes, and as it should be for the rocket,” Musk said earlier this month.

SpaceX successfully retrieved the amplifier from this mission on an unmanned ship parked in the Atlantic Ocean, even though it advanced to a less favorable outcome.

“Falcon 9 will experience its greatest strength and heat reentration at today’s launch. A good rocket failed potential,” Musk tweeted an hour before the scheduled start. After BulgariaSat-1 mission, the next line is a June 25 launch of 10 satellites from Iridium Communications Inc.

From the Vandenberg base of the Air Force on the central coast of California.
“Maybe a double-lap weekend,” SpaceX tweeted last weekend, referring to Friday’s and Sunday’s launch plans.

It would be the first time the company launched two rockets on the same weekend – despite taking off opposite coasts.

SpaceX several other flights that appear in its manifesto, but the dates in firm have not yet been announced.

Customer space
In addition to its commercial customers, SpaceX has a $ 1.6 billion contract with the National Aeronautics Administration and space to resupply the International Space Station and a second pact valued at € 2.6 billion to carry over time To orbital laboratory equipment.

SpaceX also competes for flight contracts assignments for the US Army and Air. Plans to send two private citizens traveling around the moon by the end of next year.

Hawthorne, Calif., Built the Falcon 9 and Merlin internal rocket engines, taking a Silicon Valley approach to constant improvement and close collaboration between design and manufacturing.

Musk has brought in other industry frameworks to promote innovation, including Andy Lambert, vice president of production for SpaceX, who had spent more than a decade at BMW AG.